Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein)
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299. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he will provide a special needs assistant to a school (details supplied) in County Limerick. [27570/13]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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I wish to advise the Deputy that the NCSE, through its network of local Special Educational Needs Organisers (SENOs), is responsible for processing applications from schools for special educational needs supports, including the allocation of resource teachers and Special Needs Assistants to schools. The NCSE operates within my Department's established criteria for the allocation of Special Education supports and the staffing resources available to my Department.

The NCSE allocates a quantum of SNA support for each school annually taking into account the care needs of all of the qualifying children enrolled in the school, and on the basis of the assessed care needs of the children.

All schools were advised to apply to the NCSE for resource teaching and SNA support for the 2013/14 school year by 15th March 2013. The NCSE are currently processing these applications and schools will be notified by SENOs of their resource teaching and SNA allocation for 2013/14 in advance of the coming school year, based on the number of valid applications received. All schools have the names and contact details of their local SENO. Parents may also contact their local SENO directly to discuss their child's special educational needs, using the contact details available on www.ncse.ie.

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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300. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if his attention has been drawn to the fact that special needs assistants throughout the country are losing their positions and being replaced by candidates on the JobsBridge programme; his views on whether this is unfair on SNA who are losing their full-time hours; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27599/13]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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The National Council for Special Education (NCSE), through its network of local Special Educational Needs Organisers (SENOs), is responsible for processing applications from schools for special educational needs supports, including Special Needs Assistant (SNA) support. The NCSE operates within my Department's criteria in allocating such support.

I wish to advise the Deputy that there has been no reduction to the total number of Special Needs Assistant (SNA) posts which available to the NCSE to allocate to schools this year. 10,575 whole time equivalent SNA posts are available for allocation. The NCSE allocates a quantum of SNA support for each school annually taking into account the care needs of all of the qualifying children enrolled in the school, and on the basis of the assessed care needs of the children. Once an allocation of SNA support has been made to a school, it is then a matter for the Board of Management of the school to recruit and deploy suitable SNA staff.

It has not been brought to the attention of my Department that SNAs are being replaced by candidates on the JobsBridge programme. I would welcome any further information the Deputy may provide on this matter. Details of all of the SNA allocations which have been made to schools by the NCSE are available at www.ncse.ie. All schools were asked by the NCSE to submit their applications to the NCSE for SNA support for the 2013/14 school year by 15th March, 2013, and schools will be advised of their new allocations in advance of the coming school year.